Invitation à la danse

This film includes three dance interpreted stories, choreographed and starring the great Gene Kelly. The first story is called "Circus" which tells the story of a circus clown who is secretly in love with the Circus Ballet Star who is openly in love with the Circus High-Wire-Walker. The second story is called "Ring Around The Rosy" which tells the story of a bracelet that is past from one silly lover to the next. The third story is called "Sinbad The Sailor" which tells the story of a navy sailor who, while on shore leave in Bagdad, finds a magic lamp that takes him on an animated adventure.

Each story includes an all star cast of "then" well known dancers who give outstanding performances that only Gene Kelly fans and other dancers could appreciate. It is a delightful film, that will brighten any persons video library.

This is the result of many years of effort on the part of Gene Kelly to create an all-dance film. Since he was a major-studio rather than an indie production child, Kelly convinced his home studio, MGM, to finally take on the project.

The final results, unfortunately, are mixed. The movie is simply average, with long stretches of off-timed and miscalculated action and uninspired choreography. Were Kelly to have collaborated in the writing, choreographing and direction departments, rather than taking everything on himself, things might have gone better.

The project was simply too great a task for Kelly; with other imput he might have made a film with greater perspective and flair. The story in "Circus" is only fair, and there's more pantomime than dancing for Kelly as Pierrot. Unfortantely, Jacques Ibert's music doesn't help either.

"Ring Around the Rosy" suffers from disjointed continuity, with awkward bridges and motivations. Too, the fine Tamara Toumanova as the Streetwalker provides a clash of styles when paired with Kelly as the Marine. Physically, their types don't match well, try as they will. Nor was this Andre Previn's finest compositional hour.

Finally, Roger Eden's adaptation of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's score for "Sinbad the Sailor" makes for the most effective music in the film. Kelly at last gets to display his distinctive dancing manner, and does some impressive work (at age 44) in the interesting cartoon sequences.

It's not Kelly at his best, though, and "Inviation to the Dance" remains an interesting curio, earnest on effort and short on realization. Both dance fans in general and Kelly fans in particular will value this video in their collectiona.

The first two segments of this film may or may not impress you, but do watch the third: "Sinbad the Sailor". Kelly plays an American sailor in an exotic Oriental market. He rubs an old lamp and a genie appears, played by an amazingly talented kid. After a bit of messing around,the genie gets a sailor suit, too. Then they open a book to a picture of a wonderous land. The genie transports them inside and all the rest features the two dancers (mostly Kelly alone) dancing with animation.This segment is much longer than any other live-plus-animation sequence until Mary Poppins excepting, possibly Song of the South whose sequences were nowhere near so complex as this. Kelly dances with an animated dragon (that wraps around him), into a harem, is chased by the Sultan's guards, has a long sequence with one harem girl, and then a very long sequence with the guards. This is amazing work for 1952, especially when you remember that every bit of the animation is hand-painted on cels. Hanna-Barbera (then with MGM doing Tom and Jerry directed the animation. (Kelly also did a famous dance number with Jerry in Anchors Aweigh eight years earlier.) Walt Disney advised. This is swell stuff and any fan of animation should give it a look.

It might better have been called "Invitation to the Pantomime" because there is no speaking, much less singing, in the film, a production much better suited to the stage. The movie does in fact look like a filmed stage production, and the format and ambitions of the film are not what audiences had come to expect from Gene Kelly. But this was his baby, and he wanted to take filmed dance to entirely new levels of artistic achievement. In many ways, it is a testimony to his power as a choreographer and a star that he was able to pull it off. Nevertheless, beautiful as it is, this is not everyone's cup of tea. Watching the first of the three dance sequences, I longed for Kelly to take that white paint off his mime face and stop mooning over the ballerina. He did, and the next two sequences are more enjoyable, the last being rather fun when animation takes over. ---from Musicals on the Silver Screen, American Library Association, 2013

Gene Kelly was a visionary. He was passionate about his art and he was a master.

If you are passionate about your art and creativity, you will enjoy this celebration of dance. There is no dialogue to explain what is happening. There is no person telling you what to think. Kelly brings you to a moment and allows you to make the most of it.

Did you see love, pain, joy, desire, frustration, anger...congratulations!